Friends and Family

Saturday, May 10, 2014

I finished book five in The Underland series, Gregor and the Code of Claw, by Suzanne Collins. This has been quite an accomplishment as I read the whole series with 3 fantastic 5th grade boy readers. They've loved this series, reading each one in a quick span of about 2 weeks, which is an excellent triumph. Along the way each young man created a plausible character would they be lucky enough to exist in the Underland world. At our last meeting they were so animated about discussing the series and that there is not a sixth book that I charged them with appealing to Suzanne Collins to continue the series with just one more book. Like a dying man to water they all agreed how it would help them to know how Gregor is faring and if Luxa and Ripred are holding to their bond.

As a teacher and a reader I am overjoyed by their display of emotion over the book. I love that they get to know Suzanne Collins through this work as well as The Hunger Games. We've discussed such deep topics through this series; war and peace, what it means to be a warrior, how does this compare to our war-plagued world today, and the mind-set of a soldier during battle and after. Whew. These conversations have spilled over into guns and why we need to have guns in our homes. One of my three shared that his mother almost shot him one night as he came in late through the front door of their trailer. Guns. But this blog post isn't about guns so much as it is about cookies. Not to {ever}make light of guns but honestly we need cookies more.

In one poignant scene as Gregor is preparing for battle, one in which he believes he is doomed to die, he eats one last cookie made by his kind neighbor Mrs. Cormaci. It's an oatmeal raisin cookie and that cookie got me to thinking about last bites. Not a last meal, mind you, but just a taste of one last thing-what would it be? For Gregor he was very excited to have that cookie in hand.

I'm going to make these oatmeal cranberry cookies (cuz if it were my bite I would prefer cranberry over raisin) and Martha does it best. I'm going to bring these to book club this week as we have our final conversation about The Underland Chronicles, we find a way to mail our letters to Suzanne Collins and we pick our last book of the year.

The quote:

"They settled themselves down to wait. Gregor passed Ares (his bat bond) a cookie and ate the other. If he did end up dead, he was glad the last taste in his mouth came from Mrs. Cormaci's kitchen." {339}

Happy Saturday! This post is linked to Beth Fish Reads weekly cooking meme. Click her link to find many other food-related posts.